The Biographical Management of Risk and Uncertainty
—British Veterans
Jens O. ZinnAbstract: How individuals deal with risk and uncertainties in the context of an organizational culture is a neglected area in the sociology of risk and uncertainty. This contribution reports from an explorative qualitative study (n=14) which examines the intersection of biographical experiences and organizational culture in the perspective of risk and uncertainty.
This study with ex-serviceman of the British Armed Forces shows that coming from different biographical contexts, young adults become soldiers for different reasons and they experience their time as soldiers differently. Some chose the certainty culture of the military as a life perspective;
others see it rather as a stage in their life. It is the group which assimilates most into military culture which has serious problems with the transition into civil life. But these problems seem to be rooted in the way in which soldiers adopt the military certainty culture rather than the transition itself. Soldiers who maintain competing interpretations and biographical projects are less assimilated but better prepared to deal with all kinds of issues such as drinking culture, ethical and life and death issues.
Table of Contents
1. Context
2. Research Design and Methods 3. Biographical Experiences
3.1 Former background—Why someone becomes a soldier 3.2 Expectations and reality
3.3 The transition into civil life
4. Proximity and Distance to Military Culture 4.1 Relative distance to military culture 4.2 Proximity to military culture 5. Conclusion
Acknowledgment Appendix References Author Citation
1. Context
The sociological discourse on risk and uncertainty tends to emphasize general social changes on the macro level and how it might affect individual behavior on the micro level and vice versa. This is particularly the case in BECK's work on the risk society (BECK, 1992). As a result, there is a significant lack of understanding how individuals engage and respond to risk and uncertainty on an organizational
Key words:
veterans; soldiers;
certainty culture;
risk; biography;
military culture
level even though organizational contexts significantly influence how individuals, such as soldiers, experience society. [1]
Organizations themselves are subject to significant changes. This is particularly the case with the British Armed Forces. Compulsory service ceased in 1960 and capacity was reduced from 489.600 (1951) to 240.000 (2009) with the UK spending in 2009 about 2.5% of its GDP on the military. These changes are accompanied by sociocultural and technological changes within the military which might influence soldiers' professional experiences. [2]
At the same time, the quality of war has shifted (BOURKE, 1999). The new technologies for killing go along with a growing number of civilian casualties (KASSIMERIS, 2006). This takes place at a time where missions and soldiers' behavior are scrutinized in the media; from the decision of government to go to war against Iraq, to the misbehavior of US-soldiers in Abu Ghraib, and the failure to provide soldiers with proper technical equipment. As part of this discourse there is some awareness of a need to better support veterans (HOUSE OF COMMONS DEFENCE COMMITTEE, 2005). [3]
Ex-servicemen constitute a large part of the homeless population (ca. one fourth) and are overrepresented in the prison population (e.g. THE MENTAL HEALTH FOUNDATION, 2003) while their well-being is traditionally an area neglected in public discourse and practice. There is a long tradition to downplay mental health issues and traumatic stress of soldiers and veterans, and compared to other countries the UK seems to be particularly slow in establishing strategies to deal with such problems more proactively (MENTAL HEALTH FOUNDATION, 2003;
DANDEKER, WESSELY, IVERSEN & ROSS, 2003, pp.24-29, 32). [4]
Even though high on the political agenda, a pure medical or mental health approach to soldiers' responses to risk and uncertainty underestimates the social aspects involved in soldiers' experience and responses to high risk and danger in combat situations, and uncertainty in the time dimension (e.g. how long a mission might last, what to do after leaving the services). Clinical psychologists direct attention to the social world with some arguing that a trauma is much more the result of social processes and circumstances than of the experience of a specific event itself (SHAY, 1998, ZIELKE, MEERMANN & HACKHAUSEN, 2003). As a result, post traumatic stress disorder or other mental health problems might appear years after the actual event, triggered by specific later experiences or life styles. [5]
Taking this into account, the article has a position beyond the opposition of predisposition versus terrifying event as sources of mental problems (JONES &
WESSELY, 2005). It supports the view that it is rather both that constitutes the problems soldiers or veterans respectively face later on: the specific way in which they deal with risk and uncertainty in general and how they cope with a specific
"traumatic" event. [6]
Therefore, this article will not narrow the perspective on risk and uncertainty to a medical focus on traumatic experiences. Instead, I will examine in a much
broader approach how soldiers and veterans deal with (high) risk and uncertainty in general, assuming that these patterns are structured by the soldiers'
biographical experiences and occupational socialization (compare for a biographical approach on health and illness: ZINN, 2005). The underlying hypothesis of this article is that such patterns are at the root of some problems soldiers have during duty and when they return to civilian life. The design of the study, however, does not allow the determination of the extent to which they might cause soldiers' mental health problems. Instead, the study identifies core issues and how they might influence soldiers' (biographical) management of risk and uncertainty. [7]
The motives for the biographical decision to become a soldier are influenced by earlier socialization processes and concrete circumstances of living, and these are structured by all kinds of sociostructural (class, ethnicity, region etc.) and individual factors (personal experiences). The hypothesis that the motives of why and how one joins the army differs socially and individually, is supported by research on occupational choice and youth transitions into the labor market (HEINZ, KELLE, WITZEL & ZINN, 1998; KELLE & ZINN, 1998; ZINN, 2001).
There is evidence, that social class socialization guides young adults into specific occupations which fit their "class habitus" (BOURDIEU, 1984). For example, DESMOND (2006, 2007) argues that country boys' socialization prepares them for the job and the occupational culture of Wildland Fire-fighters. [8]
Socialization processes not only structure what occupations young adults consider as an appropriate occupational perspective. The socialization within an occupation has a huge impact on behavior, attitudes and biographical decision making within and outside work (HEINZ et al., 1998; LEMPERT, 1994; ZINN, 2001). [9]
Taking this into account, the concepts of risk and uncertainty become relevant in three perspectives. For example, soldiers face high risk and uncertainty when they engage in fighting activities during missions. Among others, there is the experience of the death of comrades and the possibility of themselves dying. At the same time the structure of a mission, the clarity of tasks, and the length of a mission impact upon how soldiers respond to them and how they deal with the risks and uncertainties involved (RONA et al., 2007). Finally, being a soldier carries risks and uncertainties regarding biographical decisions, such as planning family life or developing perspectives for life after the service. It is important to note that traumatic experiences and how soldiers deal with them might be connected at all levels since they are connected themselves. [10]
In the following I will explore the general patterns and motives which guided the decision of young adults to become a soldier, how their experiences as a soldier influenced their attitudes towards their job and their biographical planning. I will finally develop an argument regarding the impact of military culture on young adults' biographical management of the life course. [11]
2. Research Design and Methods
This article reports from a qualitative research project "The Biographical Management of Risk and Uncertainty—British Veterans" which was carried through from 1st May 2007 to 31st November 2008. The explorative study has examined the biographical experiences of 14 British ex-servicemen by narrative in-depth interviews. The narrative in-depth approach was chosen to give the interviewees as much space as possible to outline and express their experiences in their own perspective and to enable detailed analysis. This method has
become prominent in Germany in the 1970s and has been used successfully in a wide range of domains since then (APITZSCH & INOWLOCKI, 2000) for example with traumatized people (ROSENTHAL, 1999, 2003, 2004) and in health and illness (RIEMANN, 1988; HANSES, 1996). For the analysis of the rich data-set produced in this way a strategy, called biographical case reconstruction, has been applied, which combines several methods of qualitative data analysis. The core idea is to contrast the narrated life story with the story as experienced. It starts with the analysis of the formal biographical data and of the structure of self- presentation—how the life is presented as a narrated story. Afterwards the experiences are analyzed, supported by microanalysis which enables the comparison of the experienced life and narrated life story. On this basis, it is possible to identify more general patterns later on—for example how people interpret their war experiences in the context of their general life experiences. The fruitfulness of this approach has already been shown by many studies but is not as common in Britain as in Germany (but compare for example:
CHAMBERLAYNE, BORNAT& WENGRAF, 2000; CHAMBERLAYNE, BORNAT
& APITZSCH, 2004). In addition to the case reconstruction method the grounded theory approach of systematic comparison was used (GLASER & STRAUSS, 1967; STRAUSS & CORBIN, 1998) to focus on specific topics and areas relatively independent of the single case structure. Here the focus is on
identifying specific themes and topics across the interview material and compare them systematically in a process of coding from open coding to axial and
selective coding. [12]
In order to maximize the richness of the qualitative data a theoretical sampling strategy was used (GLASER & STRAUSS, 1970; GOBO, 2004). The cases were selected by central factors such as age/generation, different involvement in combat while gender is excluded in this study (only male soldiers were examined) even though it can be assumed that the gender difference has significant impact on the experience of the occupational culture. [13]
Access to interviewees was sought by mixed strategies. Firstly, approaching working veterans in the context of a university; secondly, by using organizations (Salvation Army, Big Issue) to get access to homeless soldiers and in some cases through other research projects and snowballing. The result is a good mixture of different cases which cover a great variety of experiences. [14]
To all interviewees the specific interview technique was explained. They were told that the interview is voluntarily, that they can stop whenever they want and that
the interviewer will ask them to tell the "story of their life." They all agreed to these conditions and nobody rejected the interview offer. However, one interviewee decided after about 15 minutes to stop the interview being
overwhelmed by the memories which came up during the interview. Most of the interviews lasted between one and three hours; some took four to four and a half hours. Altogether, 14 interviews were available for further analysis. [15]
Interviewing veterans and possibly traumatized people is a difficult but important activity. Past research has shown that active self-reflection is an important resource in coping with traumatic experiences (ROSENTHAL, 2003). However, interviewees might become upset during or after the interview. Therefore, interviewees were provided with a list of organizations which support veterans and the process ensured that the interviewees would not be on their own after the interview but would have a friend or other support at hand if necessary. [16]
All interviews were fully transcribed (list of interviewees) and the formal structure of the life course was extracted from the interview. Interviewees were also asked to list the formal stations of their occupational and family life. These different sources of information have built the basis for the analyses. [17]
3. Biographical Experiences
For the presentation of the analysis, I tentatively use the distinction between three stages: firstly, the narrations about the circumstances and contexts of the young adults when they decided to become a soldier. This encompasses the soldiers' personal situation and the options they considered and the expectations they had.
Secondly, the socialization process into and within the military. This is to analyze the experience of becoming a soldier and learning about the reality of the job.
Thirdly, I distinguish the preparation for and the transition into civilian life. This can be through a careful planning process but sometimes happens in rather an unprepared way for example as a result of an injury which leads to early
retirement. [18]
3.1 Former background—Why someone becomes a soldier
The data show a broad variety of expectations and situations across the different generations though some typical patterns occur (DANDEKER et al., 2003). There is a dominance of working class and lower middle class background. Some of the interviewees come from a violent, abusive or what they call "broken" family setting (Albert, George). [19]
This class bias is reflected in the shock of a middle class soldier (Hans, born 1950) about the
"associated company. These people in the recruits and later on in the battalions were individuals I had just never met before in my nice comfortable middle class life and some of them were really thuggish individuals. It's a sort of awful word but they were
quite lower class and quite violent and foul-mouthed and uncaring, you know." (Hans, 201) [20]
Some reported that they were influenced by family members who had been soldiers (father, grandfather, uncle) or other significant people (friends,
neighbors), and some made their decision despite the resistance of their parents.
A typical statement is that they always wanted to become a soldier. This might be been seen as a retrospective justification (WITZEL & ZINN, 1998). However, it often seems reasonable as the outcome of a socialization process which has started with joining the Air Force Cadets as early as 12 or 13 years old. When the teenagers were asked about their occupational perspective it seems natural to stick to something they have already learned on an adventure basis:
"One of my teachers at school asked me what I wanted to do when I left and at the time I was in the Air Force Cadets, the Air Training Corps and I said, 'I'd really like to join the Air Force.' So she got me some details on the Air Force and what different qualifications I'd need. So that gave me a little bit of focus and a drive outside the family and outside relationships etc. Got my head down, got the qualifications I needed to join the Air Force." (Ryan, 2) [21]
Some interviewees emphasized that it was important to them to have a job which is worthwhile, something they could be proud of.
"For people to take a look at me instead of me just being oh Ryan Johnson, or little Ryan. I was going to be Aircraftman Johnson. I was in the Air Force and I was doing a job. You know, that was that ... that was self respect." (Ryan, 4) [22]
Similarly, Albert, an interviewee from a mixed ethnic background emphasized the importance of being respected and to have a place in society. [23]
Interviewees of the older generation emphasized that as a working class
adolescent it was natural to go to the army while middle class adolescents went to university, but as John puts it, "that wasn't for us." (John, 8) [24]
Most interviewees were attracted by the expected excitement, camaraderie and male (drinking) culture. They were allured by the expectation of an exceptional profession not just an everyday 8-hour-job. Their motives might therefore be similar to what LYNG (2005) described as being the core motive to take high risks in leisure time activities (e.g. sky divers, base jumpers, free climbers) as well as in high risk professions (e.g. fire fighters, stunt man, soldiers). At least for some young men at this age the prospect of risk taking activities and the perspective of challenges for their own abilities allured them into becoming a soldier. [25]
These motives reflect different patterns of transition into the military world. It indicates, by the example of soldiers of the older generation, how becoming a soldier was experienced as a normal pattern with little biographical uncertainty
1 The names after quoted narrations are codenames. The numbers after the name refer to the paragraph in the transcribed interview.
involved. It was experienced as something natural, not even a real decision. For a working class boy the biographical decision for an occupation was (and still is) highly pre-structured by class expectations, structural possibilities and tradition. [26]
Early experiences in military recruitment organizations, such as the Air Force Cadets, made some already as teenagers familiar with the military culture and the
"exciting tasks" long before they thought about the kind of occupation they would like to take on. It is a kind of pre-socialization into a specific group experience and culture (becoming part of a "big family"). [27]
This is in particular true for those who were keen to leave home because it was experienced as a rather unpleasant and unattractive place with little own space and exposure to violence and abuse and pressure to contribute to family income.
Coming from an unstable and uncertain context for many, becoming a member of the armed forces with a secure income and a certain career and social status has been the best and quickest option they could take which needed the least prior educational input (e.g. TZINER, 1983). Similarly, the everyday experiences of being part of an underprivileged and discriminated ethnic group, is another
background against which the prospect of a military career seemed attractive with its perception that careers are clearly pre-structured and dependent only on personal achievement (compare the case study of Albert in the second part of the article). [28]
However, there is a tension between the expected support culture of the military which structures everyday life, and the experience of military life as we will see later on. [29]
3.2 Expectations and reality
A well-known problem of the military culture is the significance of alcohol (DANDEKER et al., 2003; JOLLY, 1996). Independent of their generation, all interviewees experienced an extensive (male) drinking culture in the forces which they either actively sought or learned from the older soldiers when they joined the army. While most enjoyed the drinking culture at the beginning, this turned sour for some when it became a regular habit. Many slipped into alcoholism after they started using alcohol as a means to deal with pressure, high-risk experience or uncertainties or other issues such as boredom (e.g. George, Hans, Jack). Even when the consumption of alcohol did not become a major problem, it was always a topic to be dealt with (e.g. Jo). Some still see and use alcohol as a method of dealing with depression or sad thoughts of the past (e.g. Ryan) and most of the interviewees very much doubt that the military can be thought of without alcohol.
[30]
However, Sam who has worked in an Ordinance Corps reported that he actively refused and avoided becoming involved in the drinking culture which he sees as being typical for the fighting troops. The example of Jo (infantry), who gave up his drinking habit when he realized how much it started to reduce his professional capacities, shows how much alcohol is part of the male military identity.
Prioritizing his professionalism as a soldier he resisted the cultural pressure of his comrades and had to fight through not to drink alcohol any longer. His story of quitting alcohol is accompanied by justification. He emphasizes how strong he actually is even though he has given up drinking:
"That's [drinking] like the steam engine. You pull the cord and out goes the whistle with the steam. ... But yeah, as for, drinking, drinking was a sociable part. I mean when I was a Sergeant I could stand ... in the mess and we got through a bottle of whiskey a night. ... But I was up at 4.30 or 3.30 if I was on remedials and I'd run twice as far as them boys to prove that no effect to me. I had to prove twice as much as them. I had to carry twice as much as they did and prove that I was twice as fit" (Jo, 38).
"But yeah the drinking side is a big thing but you just have to stop it." (Jo, 40)
"I quit when I was in the army, you know, and that was every night all the boys were going 'oh what are you having?' 'Orange juice.' 'What are you having?' 'Oh I'll have a cup of coffee.' You know what I mean? Even on like St Georges Day and the Queens Birthday" (Jo, 42).
[Interviewer: "Why have you stopped drinking?"] "Well I just had enough. ... I know my body inside out. My legs were my lifeline in the army because I had to be fitter than the rest of them. I had to keep a certain weight and everything and eventually getting up at 3.30 in the morning I could feel myself sort of slowing down a bit. It was a bit harder to get out of the bed than it should have been." (Jo, 46) [31]
Altogether, drinking is not just an external pressure one has to comply with. As Hans reported, drinking was part of something he wanted and enjoyed when he was a young adult who had just joined the army:
"When I first joined the army I got taken aback to all these people I was mixing with.
But as you do, you know, in a community you conform or you don't survive I mean at the time it wasn't about conforming or doing something I didn't want to. As a young man some of it actually seemed quite attractive. Certainly the standard thing was, to go out every night and drink as much as you can, and I have to say they were great times as well, we thoroughly enjoyed many of them. So it is an alcohol culture and it's important for bonding and building a team, and so on. And all the macho stuff as well, you know." (Hans, 38) [32]
There seems to be a fine line between just enjoying alcohol and when it causes harm which significantly threatens the abilities of soldiers to do their duty.
However, highly trained soldiers such as Marines might become aware earlier of the negative impact of alcohol on their performance while others might slip into addiction as part of their everyday routine or habit. [33]
Most of the interviewees got their excitement and camaraderie when they joined the corps even though it was not always as exciting as expected. John, coming from the older generation born in the 1940s and a working class context summed up and taking it with humor:
"And so I went to ... where the Marines started off. ... I'd started this sort of new life ..
as a junior Marine. I realized very quickly that actually I'd made a bit of a boo-boo and this really wasn't half as exciting as they'd told me." (John, 8) [34]
Hans from a middle class context and born in the 1950s was shocked by how hard the training and selection process were. However those who did special training were proud of what they achieved (e.g. Ryan, Albert). [35]
Coming from a social context where violence, bullying and gang crime seem to be an everyday experience, becoming a soldier is for such young men often experienced as a natural step to do what they do or like to do anyway. Even though training and controlling the emotions have been challenging for Albert he uses a metaphor to describe his experience of joining the army:
"I joined the Royal Marines, did 10 months basic training. There started with 70-odd of us, finished with 7 of us, I was one of those 7. I took to it like a fish to water."
(Albert, 1) [36]
Hans, reflecting on his military experience, comes overall to a similar conclusion as John:
"Certainly overall I would say I thoroughly enjoyed it. I don't, you know, classic remark, I don't regret a minute of it. Well, actually you do. There are lots of minutes I can pick out and regret, and certainly I would have done things even within the army differently but overall I thoroughly enjoyed it. You know, obviously towards the end I was disenchanted and that's why I left." (Hans, 20) [37]
However, what Hans might be referring to is that in combat situations, it is often rather about survival than any heroic activity. It is about getting through a high risk situation alive. Patriotic motives are regularly downplayed by the soldiers themselves (compare also: GIBSON & ABELL, 2004). [38]
But he also comes up with another problem. The excitement at the beginning becomes diminished or supplanted by the reality of combat which causes for some soldiers ethical issues or risks for the integrity of their identity. The question of responsibility looms large and not everybody is able to shift it to superiors. [39]
At the end of his career, Hans became disturbed about his own attitudes towards the enemy when he worked as military adviser for a foreign country.
"Looking at it you can see it's very, very easy to go to a completely foreign
environment in fighting in combat and I think this may have been some of the issues the Americans had in Vietnam because you go into a completely foreign environment.
So the civilians are actually foreign and part of that environment and you see them rather than individuals you see them as part of the battlefield and you do get into very, very unpleasant sort of racist judgments, you know that you would never have you would never have applied those judgments in Northern Ireland, well they don't matter.
You know, if our attack is going through the village it's going through the village. You
would never have applied that logic in an environment and a population that you were friendly with or knew." (Hans, 26)
"And the other thing is that whilst it is not an excuse it's a fact is that you can get involved in things and you're not necessarily in control of the surrounding
circumstances. If an attack has got a certain pace, you know, it's difficult to call it to a halt, you know." (Hans, 26) [40]
There are quite different ways in which soldiers deal with ethical questions while doing their job. Jo claimed that he did not want to become promoted because he would have had to take over more responsibilities which he did not want to do.
Instead, he decided to stick to a specific and clearly defined task and tried to fulfill this as well as possible. For him, ethical concerns were damaging for his
professional attitude.
"The line is really blurry on that. In full combat situations, my rounds must have killed females and children alike, but as far as I was concerned, they're expendable. If it gets a job done, yeah, I could drop in a grenade into a house to clear that house."
(Jo, 82)
"I stopped active service ... because I couldn't go any higher ... than I was. ... The only way I could go higher was to become an officer and that means I have to think. ... And the only idea of thinking I wanted to do was keep me and the other 3 geezers alive." (Jo, 130) [41]
Many veterans valued the biographical certainty the military provided them with.
The military gave them orientation and stability for their life (Jim). When they decided to join the armed forces, it transformed an overwhelming contingency of an uncertain future into a structured and manageable complexity not only in the sense of biographical orientation but also in everyday activities, where the military provided them with everything they needed. The decision was in some cases relatively dramatic where the military was the last chance to escape imprisonment after the beginning of a criminal career and brought the interviewees "back on track" (Jim, Albert). One interviewee who dropped out the military after his compulsory service very much regretted the loss of certainty and career prospects and never managed to find a stable place within society again (Frank). [42]
For some the corps was not just an institutional background which structured their life. In contrast to his unstable and abusive family background, George described the army even as the only real family he ever had. This included not only
economic but also emotional certainty. The metaphor of a big family is shared in a similar way by Jack:
"I decided to join the Army Catering Corps. But it was funny because all through my army life, it was like a family to me because I'd never had a family and I'd never had a ... what you could call a home. And to start with it was great. I was the happiest little soldier in the world. I had good mates all around me. I had a job. I was learning a trade. You know? I had a career and it ... it was lovely." (Jack, 8) [43]
Two important aspects come together in these cases: the lack of social support outside the military such as a family they could fall back on if something went wrong, and at the same time the rather enthusiastic description of the military experience and the priority of the military community against civilian social
contacts. There is little room for admitting an ambivalence towards the military, or seeing the weaknesses of the military in these descriptions but the expectation that the military would be like a family, the central basis on which to build a life. [44]
Another issue soldiers have to deal with is the possibility of being killed. As long as soldiers are not directly involved in fighting activities or do not fight face to face it seems to be much easier for them to deal with experiences of dying and killing.
Witnessing the bloody death of a comrade is exactly the kind of traumatic experience which is difficult for soldiers to cope with. [45]
However, many seem to deal with this possibility, at least at the beginning, with a feeling of confidence that "it will not be me." The experience of comrades actually dying makes it much clearer to them, that it could also be them and the reality of dying becomes more concrete. Hans has described that in his case this was a slow process during which he became aware of people "actually dying doing this job." For most of his career he was confronted with only a small number of casualties. This made it relatively easy for him to suppress this reality of the job.
"I went straight from passing the recruitment training to the battalion. On the first tour we lost 4 people killed and 2 injured. And I was only actually sort of involved in one of those incidents but they're all part of a hardening process ... I presume there are some veterans you've spoken to who have a sort of cataclysmic sort of Damascine moment, you know, where they were plunged into huge combat on day one. Looking back on it ... I got assimilated and gradually drip fed it and so I've always felt that by the time I came to sort of major combat that I'd actually been sort of trickle fed it, you know, even when I was a recruit, in fact I remember there was a military funeral of a man who had been shot from 2 Para and, yeah, people actually die doing this and there were all his family were gathered there extremely distressed obviously when the coffin was then taken off to the garrison church. ... And whilst I was only involved in one of those incidents, you know, they still helped to inure you and cushion you and you know you get a little bit hardened, a little bit casual about things as you go along."
(Hans, 20) [46]
For the Royal Marine, Albert, who was much more involved in active face-to-face fighting, the possibility of dying was an everyday possibility. It became, however, even more concrete when he realized that from mission to mission he had become increasingly more seriously injured. What he did was to concentrate on the present and not to plan for a future which might never come. The biographical horizon was shortened and the uncertainties he dealt with were only the everyday life risks. As a result, the experience of living intensified.
"I never thought I would reach a certain age. Each and every time I went away, whatever it was I was doing, whatever deployment I was on I would always come back with an injury and each and every time that injury would be more severe than
the one I had previously. ... There's a phrase we use in the Marines those that have fought for life, have a sense for life greater and above those that haven't and that means that because you realize your own mortality you realize that life is arbitrary, you realize that life is short so everything is grasped between here and there. They don't look towards the future." (Albert, 10) [47]
However, many just hope and are confident that it will not be them as long as they are excellent. But at one point they had to accept that it might be out of their control and they might be the one.
"I had good friends. I've lost 3 of them. It was just how it was done, you can only accept it. It's a greedy and a horrible thing but when you're in the middle of a fire fight you hear, I don't know if people have sort of told you, you hear (claps twice) yeah?
(claps once) That's the round going off (claps once again), and that's the round landing. It's the most jealous the most selfish idea going that you can sit there and go thank fuck that ain't me and then you can look and it'll be your mate and you just turn around and say sorry mate, it's yours. We are selfish but it's what we do." (Jo, 14) [48]
3.3 The transition into civil life
The transition into civil life is in many respects difficult. Socialization into the military certainty culture meant that almost everything was organized for the soldiers. For many, everyday life became narrowed to military life, where even most friends and social contacts are soldiers. As a result, there is no longer a perspective which goes beyond professional life. Even though courses are offered to prepare soldiers for the transition into civil life, many make the transition relatively unprepared. [49]
Ex-servicemen have to learn to take over full responsibility for their life again with very little direct support. They have to make their own plans, and they have to deal with ambivalence, contradictions and uncertainties of everyday life
themselves. There is no longer "the corps" which cares for them. They have to find a new biographical project to focus on and they have to develop or find their own certain life basis. Considering that many had chosen the military as an occupational context which exactly took over the responsibility for all these everyday life decisions or because of the highly structured context the military delivers where many decisions are made by people higher up in the hierarchy, it is not just a process of remembering former competencies. For some, it might even be the first time that they have to learn these abilities after being socialized into a dependency culture at a relatively early stage of their life. [50]
JOLLY (1996) argues that soldiers often forget how long and intense their conditioning process through training and advanced training has been. The de- institutionalization process is not easier or shorter. There are a number of ways to leave the army: to retire after the normal time of duty, to be injured and retire early, to develop mental or other health issues (e.g. addiction to alcohol, post- traumatic stress disorder), to develop other interests in life or to develop a distance to the military culture or practice of soldiering. JOLLY argues in her
qualitative study about the transition of soldiers into civilian life that however soldiers leave the forces there are three steps they have to go through:
"confrontation," "disengagement" and "resocialisation" (pp.10-11, 155). Those indicate a long process of "deconditionalisation" from military life. Some soldiers might manage the steps quicker or slower but for a successful transition
everyone has to go through them. Who does not would fail to manage the start of a new life as a civilian? "Confrontation" is the process during which the ex-
serviceman acknowledges that there is a need of a change in direction and lifestyle. "Disengagement" stands for the process of questioning older loyalties, judgments and priorities. Finally, "resocialisation" stands for the need to develop a new social identity. The soldier has to find a new place and role in society which is no longer determined by the military identity. [51]
This three-step logic can be found in the presented study as well which shows a broad range of different transitions and stages. Frank never got his life sorted after leaving the compulsory service. He became involved in criminal activities and consequently had no chance to join the forces again. He found a partner who stabilized him for a while but when she died Frank became homeless until he found a place in an accommodation for the homeless organized by a charity. [52]
Jim had difficulties getting his life sorted after he left the services. JOLLY (1996) would explain it by his "unwillingness" to disengage with the past and to develop new positive perspectives for the future. His identity is still defined by the military experience and he has not yet recognized that things have to change. [53]
Similarly, George is still occupied by the bad experiences he experienced within the forces which have coined his life. He finally got acknowledgment that his supervisor did not treat him correctly. He has managed his addiction to alcohol, but he is depressive and he struggles to stabilize his life. Being occupied by military issues he has not yet developed a positive attitude towards civilian life. [54]
Chris has just left the forces after 4 years due to an injury and is struggling to come to terms with his experiences. He got compensation "but never heard anything else from the army." Since he has at least a trade he has some perspective and direction where to go:
"I'm an engineer, a machinist. So luckily I've got a trade behind me and I got into machining again. That's what I really wanted obviously with the trade going down now there's no more sheet steel works anymore. They're all getting made redundant or getting laid off so I've started a new career now. I'm going back to college." (Chris, 18) [55]
However, he has little contacts and the one's he has are ex-serviceman. It is unclear whether he is able to successfully implement his plans for a new perspective in the civilian world since he is still occupied by some "traumatic"
experiences and the military life style. Since he has little contact with "civilians," it is not yet clear whether he can leave behind the military life style. [56]
Jo has ambitious plans for his new life but is still driven by his military life style and worldviews. He argues that civilians are "stupid," in his view incompetent and they lack professionalism. When he worked, for example, as security guard for a diamond courier his suggestions to improve security measures were rejected as too expensive. He explains by an example how he dealt professionally with an attempted robbery even though his behavior was not acknowledged but criticized:
"When I was a diamond courier I had 2 young ... gentlemen that wanted to take the diamonds off ... I just walked up and I went, 'gentlemen it's a real bad idea.' And they said, 'oh yeah, why do you reckon that?' And I just opened up me jacket to take out me 9mm browning and shot one in the kneecap. I went, 'well that's the first reason.' I said, 'the second reason is your mum will never see you again.' I said, 'because the next 2 rounds are going straight between your eyes.' And they just hands up, up against the wall, and the police arrived and said, 'don't you think that was a bit excessive?'" (Jo, 66) [57]
He presents himself as strong and self-controlled. He has great plans for his own enterprise but he has not fully disengaged with his former life and attitudes.
Instead, he insists on his military identity and attitude. There is not yet much of an insight that this has to change and he cannot turn it into a positive perspective.
The military worldview remains the right standard against which he judges the civilian world:
"That's the mentality we have. And I don't care how long you've been out of the forces you've still have that mentality. It's a PMA, positive mental attitude. You have to have it because you can't get through otherwise. Your mate could just drop dead next to ya because a round's hit him. ... Yeah, it's just that when I was working for the civvies they had no idea like that. They don't use a positive mental attitude. They don't have any idea of security, personal, professional or otherwise and then you just have to adapt and overcome and you shouldn't have to adapt and overcome." (Jo, 66) [58]
It is not clear yet whether and when he will fully engage with civilian life. Ryan seems to have made the step into civil life successfully (I will discuss his case in more detail below). He is engaged in a new biographical project. He is a caring father for his child and with a challenging job at the university. He is occupied with managing his new life even though he is proud about his time as a Legionnaire—
he served 5 years in the French Foreign Legion. His service is still part of his new identity but his identity is dominated by his son and his present job at the
university, not by his past as soldier. I will show later on how his valuation of the family structures his biographical decision-making. [59]
Albert's abrupt discharge from the services pushed him into a long phase of confrontation (compare below). His biographical project to come to terms with his failure has helped him to get through higher education. He has transformed from a warrior to a civil person but he is still determined to engage and explain what happened to him. This helped him to engage in an academic career and to acquire educational certificates. He also has a family and has sorted a new second life. Speaking with his wife about his past and reflecting about his
experiences has helped him to accept good and bad experiences and what he has done and now values differently. Having said this, at the time of the interview he is still very much driven to explain what is wrong with the military that he has failed when he became discharged because of drugs. He might finally finish with this legacy and find a new biographical project. [60]
JOLLY (1996) uses a rather homogenous approach to the three steps soldiers have to go through. The emphasis of the presented research is about the
individual differences. Soldiers seem to differ significantly in the reasons why they joined the army and how they experienced the services. In a risk and uncertainty perspective, they differ regarding their approach to biographical (un)certainty. Do they deal with remaining contradictions or ambivalence of civilian life and military culture or do they exclude one side? Do they include biographical uncertainty in their planning or do they exclude the future from their everyday reflections and decision-making? Have they ways or strategies established to deal with pressure, traumatic experiences or other problems (e.g. ethical issues) or do they tend to suppress them with the help of alcohol, for example? [61]
The argument is that it makes a significant difference whether soldiers have chosen the military because of the certainty culture it offers, whether they maintained a civilian life and a civilian biographical perspective or they fully adapted to the military certainty culture. Even when they intensively engage, it makes a huge difference whether they still have their own biographical project or fully assimilate and eliminate every thought about the life after the services. [62]
In the next section, I will support this argument of the impact of proximity and distance to military culture for soldiers' experience of the services by presenting four case studies. [63]
4. Proximity and Distance to Military Culture
Soldiers engage with the military culture in different ways. Some adapt to the expectations which often coincide with what they wanted to do as young men anyway. This includes partying and drinking alcohol and doing all the "macho stuff." In so doing, they become part of the "big family." A number of them seem not to be able to draw a line for when drinking habits must be questioned
because they endanger their professional abilities. They become part of a black and white "male" military culture which allows little weakness and expects strong discipline and tend to support a life that focuses on the military, minimizing external contacts. The black-white perspective of reality helps soldiers to be able to do their duty where doubt and self-reflection might slow down the ability to effectively act as soldier.2 Where the comrades are priority the family is secondary and might even be endangered. Where the military is the absolute instance of right and wrong there are no resources which could help to deal with
2 This does not mean that soldiers are uncritical. One described that there might be a lot of discussion before the decision for a mission is made, e.g. whether Britain should go to war to Iraq. If the decision is made, however, the discussions shift. It is no longer about the basis of the mission but how best to do the job.
problems that are caused by the military itself. This does not question that there are military instances to deal with internal problems which are to a high degree efficient. But when these instances do not work for these soldiers there are no other sources available. [64]
However, another group of soldiers does never forget the world beyond the military they will return to after their military career. They might adapt to the black and white worldview as a need for clarity to act (JOLLY, 1996). However, they do not lose some distance to their profession and military life, whether they are ironically questioning everyday practice (John), seeing it as part of personal development (Ryan), criticizing the system and the incompetence of the
comrades (Paul), questioning the emotional honesty of what soldiers are doing (Albert), or rather are being pulled out by the expectations of wife and children to engage more with the family (Hans). These are soldiers who might have
problems to deal with caused by their job itself (conflicts with colleagues or
supervisors, problems to deal with experiences, weakness) but they have sources which help them to do so and give them orientation for biographical decisions which might even lead out of the military. [65]
In the following, I will underpin my argument about the significance of distance and proximity to the military culture as source of problems to deal with risk and uncertainty in everyday life and biographical action, by four case studies. [66]
4.1 Relative distance to military culture
The following examples from two different generations of soldiers, John and Ryan, show a relative distance to the military culture. They might engage in training and might love the job as a soldier but even though they identify with their profession, they are not "absorbed" by it. They have values and orientations which are prior to the military. [67]
John
John was born in the 1940s. He lived with his family in the West of Britain in the slum area of a working class town even though his father came from a middle class background. His experiences are in many respects typical for the situation of working class teenagers at the time. When looking for an occupational
perspective, the soldier's job gives the possibility to leave home, to see the world and to make career without higher school leaving certificates. [68]
However, John differs significantly. He went to a grammar school and would have been able to pursue a middle class career. Instead, when John was 16, he left school to join the junior Marines. He stayed almost seven years with the Marines.
After several injuries, he was finally released from service in his early twenties but without any occupational qualifications. [69]
It is characteristic for John's life story that he stresses the tension between the working class identity he feels attached to and his above working class average
education which enabled him to go to a grammar school and to "look through the system" and to criticize incompetent superiors. As a result, he emphasizes his role as a rebel wherever he had to deal with supervisors or superiors. [70]
Originally, it never occurred to him to choose a different job than becoming a soldier. This was what people of his part of the town do and it was the easiest and quickest way out of the living conditions of a huge family with more than 10 children in a small flat where no privacy existed.
"I was the only person who went to ... that grammar school. So they... we didn't sit around talking about books or anything like that and we didn't sit around talking about universities. I didn't know what a university was right, until much later. I ... I thought teachers were born to ... you know, they were the other people from the other side of town we called them. They're the teachers, doctors, people like that but that wasn't for us." (John, 8) [71]
John never thought of making a career within the marines. Becoming an officer was not an option in his working class identity.
"So it meant that I had the ... qualifications but no culture [to become an officer]. I was firmly working class and that's all I wanted to be. So if you're working class you hate the officers which I did very well, you see? I hated them for 6 years and of course they didn't like that very much ..." (John, 8) [72]
As a result he "had occasionally, from time to time to go in front of a board and explain why I wouldn't be an officer you see, because they don't like that." In his life story, John emphasizes this tension between his ability to do the demanding training as a Marine and his intellectual capacity reading the Times instead of the usual tableau press preferred by his comrades and officers. Thus he provoked the officers which do not have the same educational level as he had.
Interestingly, even though John emphasized his working class culture he indeed differs systematically. For him there was always a world different from the military and a Marine's job was only a job. He never fully assimilated to into this kind of culture. He was always different, he did neither fit fully into the working class environment nor in the position of a simple Marine and this was an important part of his identity which helped him to deal with his experiences ironically. [73]
John describes himself as a renegade. He became a renegade when he joined the army and maintained this attitude later on when he left because of an injury and sought a new occupational perspective. As soon as he engaged in a position he questioned the supervisor:
"I ... found life still fairly difficult after the services, and I was always a bit of a renegade before it and I joined and I kept telling them their system was wrong. And I'd go for a drink every lunchtime ..., and I'd be very happy afterwards, they don't like that very much. ... You were given an allocation and 2 drawers which were cards of all the workers of the factories they'd given you and then they said ... 'will you count all the people over 50 who you've got', and you'd go through manually. So I counted
all of mine so ... say 120 or something. The inspector came around and said, 'have you got your numbers John' and I said, 'yeah I had.' I had 147 and he looked at it and he said, 'where are the 5 bar gates?' I said, 'what?' He said, 'well there's no 5 bar gates on it.' He said, 'I want to see the 5 bar gates.' That is when you're counting one, 2, 3, 4 and across, 5, a 5 bar gate I said, 'well I've given you the number.' 'I want to see how you've done it.' I went 'oh, bugger.' So off he went and all I did was put 145 5 bar ... into 5 bar gates. He came back and I said, 'there you are I've done it.' 'Very good.' Well of course, it meant nothing. Well of course, everybody else knew what I was doing, so I was undermining this guy and, you know, his stupidity." (John, 14) [74]
John finally went back into education got access to higher education and became a university lecturer but he never fully gave up this habit to question the superiors and "the system." [75]
Ryan
Ryan was born in the 1960s. John hasn't said much about conflicts at home while Ryan's parents had continuous conflicts until they finally divorced. Ryan disliked school and was much more interested in practical things. At the age of 12–13 he joined the Air Force Cadets and wanted to join the Air Force later on.
"[There have been] problems at home, but my ... my goals of joining the military were to get away from home, to earn some money and see a little bit of the world.
Traveling a little bit of the world wasn't a prime consideration because I was only 18 and I felt well I've got the rest of my life to travel the world. But definitely to get away from home and get some money and for people to take a look at me instead of me just being oh Ryan Johnson, or little Ryan. I was going to be Aircraftman Johnson. I was in the Air Force and I was doing a job. You know, that was that ... that was self respect." (Ryan, 4) [76]
His occupational decision was, however, very much dominated by his parents. He wanted to become a gunner while his parents persuaded him to become an engineer. With the age of 18, he joined the Air Force and became a Royal Engineer but the job itself left him unsatisfied.
"I really didn't want to be an engineer but I had a word with my dad and my dad persuaded me that engineering might be the best way because number one you don't have to live in a hole in the ground. You don't have to carry a gun and get shot at.
You get a bedroom. You're always on a base, that's for the aircraft and you've got a trade at the end of the day so when you leave the Air Force you would have a trade so after a bit of persuading I decided to join as an engineer and I joined when I was 18, I joined the Air Force." (Ryan, 2) [77]
After his first year, his parents had huge conflicts. The unsatisfied job and the conflicts at home lead to his decision to go back home.
"And my mum and dad started having problems at home. So I was being torn between not ... really not enjoying the job I was in and torn between trying to go and
help out my mum and dad so there were lots of ... lots of things going on in my mind."
(Ryan, 2)
"I didn't want to go back home ... but I went back home for a few months. My mum and dad were still having serious problems and my mum and dad had split up by that time. My mum was living with my sister and my dad was living by himself." (Ryan, 2)
"I got a job in a company, boring as hell. ... You know a really boring job. ... But it was nice over the Christmas period—I had some work." (Ryan, 2) [78]
In this situation, he referred to an ongoing source of conflict, that he had to do something for his country but he is arguing that he did his part and wants to do something for himself. By then all his occupational decisions were influenced by others (his parents) with the result that he ended up doing things he did not really like to do.
"I've done something for my country that you haven't done and for the vast majority of your friends, you know 99% of your friends haven't done. So I think I've earned my right to be able to go and do something else that I want to and that's caused some arguments in the past, you know, a couple of ones." (Ryan, 14) [79]
In the following summer, a friend who was currently working with the French Foreign Legion invited him to France. He was impressed by the stories about the job as a soldier within the French Foreign Legion and the public acknowledgment.
"Being down in the south of France, my mate had a beautiful uniform. And we were walking round and about and he's getting ... the attraction from the women is amazing. And we're walking into bars and ... and ... just maybe all the tables are being used and you see the matre'd going ... they usher him across and clear the table and there's an extra table in the corner for the legionnaire. You know? And just the respect that he seemed to have within that social group I thought was great. He was telling me all the different things he does and he was talking to other legionnaires from ... from Germany, from Britain, a couple from China and they really enjoyed it and they all had the same things to say about it, how hard it was but the sense of self worth that they have at the end of it and it's something that I really didn't have at the time. I was demoralized with my job. I felt as if I'd let myself down, let my family down and this was something that I could associate with." (Ryan, 18) [80]
On his way back home, he signed a five year contract with the French Foreign Legion without consulting his parents. This can be seen as an important step he took to detach from his family and become an independent adult. Ryan is very proud about his time at the French foreign legion but finally it is only a stage of his life:
"If I'd left the Air Force and gone into engineering work or gone back to XXX, I would be in a 9-5 run of the mill job ... I would have nothing I could turn around and say I'm proud of this, I'm proud of that. But now ... I'm extremely proud of my 5 years in France, extremely proud." (Ryan, 4) [81]
On the other hand, when his contracts ended and his girlfriend became pregnant it was no question for him at all to leave the French Foreign Legion (FFL) and to develop a new occupational perspective even though he could have stayed with the FFL.
"I can still remember sitting in the kitchen and I had about 2 weeks left to decide what I was going to do, I was starting to fall for this girl and she came back in and she says 'I've got some news for you' and I went 'oh yeah what's that?' She says 'I'm pregnant' and that's it, the decision was made, I don't go back in. She had fallen pregnant. So my decision at that point was made for me. I don't regret my decision, not ... not for any way, shape or form because I've got my son. If it was anything else she would have told me I'd probably have gone back in. Seriously, if she hadn't fallen pregnant I'd probably have gone back in." (Ryan, 14) [82]
For Ryan the family is a central factor in his decision-making. This became clear in three biographical situations. When he decided to train as an Engineer with the Royal Air Force, when he left the Air Force to help his parents when their
relationship broke apart, and when he expresses how the pregnancy of his girlfriend influenced his decision. "My decision at that point was made for me"
describes that the impending birth of his son leaves no other option but to stick to the family and to give up soldiering. This indicates strong normative orientations which prioritize the family in his biographical decisions over anything else. This priority, however, does not question his professional involvement in the military. [83]
Ryan vividly describes the professional discipline necessary to do a proper job and the self worth he got from managing this challenging job. He frames his biographical decisions in a kind of developmental logic where his time as Legionnaire has its place without dominating his identity. At the end of a long interview, he summarized his biographical approach as follows:
"Fifteen years ago if someone had said, 'you're going to work in a university', 'don't be silly', you know, because none of my family had ever been to university and I was the only one, you know? So there we go. And it is, it's ... But then again I think that's got a lot to do with me being in the forces. A challenge was set. And if a challenge is set you either rise to the challenge and you compete with that challenge as much as you can or you don't. And if you don't compete with challenge ... If you don't compete and you don't strive to better yourself, you may as well just have started your first day at school and stayed there as a 4 year old. You know, because every single thing in life is going to be a challenge; bringing up family, running a household, getting a job teaching, learning more." (Ryan, 18) [84]
As a result he has become the self-confident person he wanted to become:
"But now ... With 5 years ... I'm extremely proud of my 5 years in France, extremely proud. But because I've been through that, in a different situation, with people that don't speak your language and in aggressive situations I think I can ... I can turn my hand in just about any role that's put to me and I know that no matter what, I might not be the best person that does it, but I will be so focused and I will drive until I ... I
fulfill that role. So it's given me a sense of direction, it's given me a focus, a
determination, that no matter what happens, even if you turned around and you say I've got to climb up the outside of this building using a piece of thread I'll find a way of doing it eventually. You know I might not be the smartest person in the world but it's given me that sense of direction and that I wouldn't have had before I don't think."
(Ryan, 4) [85]
4.2 Proximity to military culture
The army offers support in particular to people who have problems in finding a place in society or to get their life sorted. Frank (1930) makes this argument explicit when he indicates that since he left the forces everything went worse and he was never able to get his life sorted. In the same vein, Jules emphasized how important the military was for him to "cool down." Having been involved in crime and violence the military was for him the last chance to prevent imprisonment. [86]
There are a number of interviewees who are particular vulnerable, some because of their personal experiences, others because of being part of a socially
discriminated group or a mixture of both. [87]
The hypothesis is that the lack of alternative interpretations of social reality and the lack of resources from civilian life are central to soldiers' problems in
managing the transition back into civilian life. That does not mean that these people ever had established a place within society before they became a soldier.
However, being used to living with the support of the military certainty culture they are unable to deal with the challenges of the transition. The following examples show that the problems can start even before they left the forces and have their origins in their military life style3. [88]
George
George has a working class background. He reported that his brother abused him and he wanted to leave home as soon as possible. Starting a military career seemed to be the best option for him to leave the family without having further school leaving certificates and family support to engage in further education.
Another motivation to join the forces might have been his former involvement in the "Army Cadet Force" for 12 to 13 years. He became a physical training instructor and after being with the Cadets he "always wanted to join the army."
"I asked my father when I left school 'will you sign the papers so I can go in the Army?' He said, 'no, you've got to get an apprenticeship first.' And that really hurt me. ... And I got half way through my apprenticeship and when I was 18 I couldn't do what I wanted so on my 18th birthday I actually went down to the Army Recruitment Office without my parents knowing and signed on because I didn't have to have their permission then. And I just walked in one day and said to my mother, 'there's a month's wages I'm off on Monday.' 'What do you mean you're off on Monday?' 'I've 3 This life style is the result of earlier biographical experiences and how they merged with the
military culture.
joined the Army. I'm going. You can't do anything about it.' And I stayed for 9 year, teaching physical training." (George, 6) [89]
He reports that at his time alcohol was very much part of the everyday culture in the army:
"I enjoyed my army career but that one screwed us up. How to spite, how to kill people and how to get drunk (laughs) but not necessarily in that order from my experience; We were serving in the Falklands ... and my boss says 'we'll go into the mess and have a drink when we finish work.' I said, 'yeah, OK boss.' And we went into the mess and he said, 'what did you ... what do you want to drink?' I said, 'I'll have a coke to start with because it's going to be a long night' and he head-butted us and said, 'you don't come into the mess and order coke' (laughs) and that's ... in them days that was the attitude of the army. Once you got ... you went into the mess you didn't drink soft drinks or coffee or anything, you drank alcohol, which was fine."
(George, 6) [90]
A major trigger for him to drink even more was when ...
"I lost 6 comrades in one night and I was supposed to be one of them which has really done my head in. ... I was told that I would never, ever serve in combat again."
(George, 6) [91]
However, it seemed to be more the general habit of drinking in the spare time which caused him problems than this particular incident.
"While I was in the forces I ended up on 2 bottles of rum a day which was normal for me. And that's when I decided I've had enough; I'm going into rehab because it was ruining my marriage. My wife never knew when I was going to return home. I'd left one Friday morning at half past 7, I didn't arrive back until the Saturday at 8 o'clock in the morning ... I'd been to work on Friday and we all went on a ... out on the booze and we ended up back in the mess drinking. And my time in the forces it was a way of life. It wasn't frowned upon. But I never missed work through it. (George, 20)
"That was life in the army in them days. That's how you covered your That's how you got rid of all the memories. That was the military's way of letting you ... why they encouraged it because if you's got your flashbacks you drank and it went away and that's the way life was in the forces." (George, 20) [92]
He stressed in his interview that he had a traumatic experience which caused some problems and he started to drink increasingly more alcohol. Since such experiences are often used to justify failure, e.g. to deal with alcohol properly, we might be careful to judge whether this claim is real. However, what is important is not the experience of a traumatic event but the growing involvement in a drinking habit to deal with the challenges of the job. Drinking with the comrades became ever more important and George eventually became addicted to alcohol. [93]
There are some more hints which might help to understand how George dealt with the army experience. For George, the army seemed not to be a specific stage in his life but a way of living. He loved going out and drinking with the comrades. It might be incidental, but both interviewees, George and Jack, who had serious problems which ended in homelessness and addiction to alcohol, used the metaphor of the family when they spoke about the their time in the army. For George, the army was even the only family he ever had. He used a short anecdote to emphasize that the army was always more important for him than his partner.
"Yeah. My relationship was with the armed forces. I was married ... I was happily married. My ex-wife turned around and said, 'are you married to me or are you married to your job?' I said, 'well sorry but my job comes first' (laughs)." (George, 88) [94]
George has never been able to develop a life outside the military. When he was made redundant because of his alcohol problems his partner left him and there were no longer any resources he could refer to. With no contact with his original family, he was on his own after his wife had left him and he became homeless. [95]
There are a number of similar cases. For example, Jack who worked in the army catering services and became a Master Chef after more than ten years service.
He felt overstrained but his problems were ignored which lead to huge difficulties from alcohol addiction to attempts to commit suicide. Instead of presenting such a case I will discuss the case of Albert who combines a number of factors usually considered as contributing to high vulnerability. However, he managed with some professional help. His case might help to understand what kind of pressures and experiences soldiers have to deal with. [96]
Albert
Albert was born in the 1960s and comes from a mixed ethnic background. He was brought up by his (single) mother and lived from 13 years onwards in a foster family until he joined the Royal Marines at the age of 16. He describes
fundamental problems within the foster family and he was also involved in gang crime activities.
"As I'm from a broken background I didn't have a particularly stable life, younger life anyway; different schools, different places in the country. I've lived in foster homes and certain institutions of the state. I was a ward of the state for a number of years.
And in between all of that I lived with my ... my mother who traveled Europe in the ...
in the 60's and the 70's as a single mum ... just as ... just as a single woman she did it all by herself so it was a very exciting childhood you could say. There was nothing fixed in it. My horizons were very, very broad because I saw a lot of the world as a young man, different cultures etc. I spoke Italian4 and went to an Italian school when I was a kid. So that was that. At the age of 13 all that stopped and I lived with a foster family to the age of 16. I had to get out of that situation because things were getting
4 For reasons of anonymity the country and language was changed.
